After living a week under one roof, working together at the farm, walking together in silence, sharing breakfasts, dinners and thoughts, the group talk comes quite naturally. Here we are: Chiara, Ana, Pascale, Cynthia, Sophie and Erik, sitting in a circle in the shade of the biggest building in Spain, built during the Franco regime: Universidad Laboral de Gijón. After a tour of art centre LABoral and a soothing minute of silence we look back on the days we spent together.

A talk about capitalism and workers cooperatives, about poverty and looking for a better future by walking away from the harsh rural life. About the pros and cons of the revitalisation of industrial cities as Bilbao and Aviles. 

What did we learn, what do we take home? These are complex and confusing times, but our talk ends on a positive note: united we stand, plants and humans, and however small, changes can be made. There might me no ’them’ in capitalism, this week there was definitely an ‘us’. 

References:

LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial, Gijón/Xixón: http://www.laboralcentrodearte.org/ Universidad Laboral de Gijón, Spains’s biggest building: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universidad_Laboral_de_Gij%C3%B3n Interview “Asturias, a wasted agricultural paradise” between Elena Bandera and Emilio Ricco https://www.lavozdeasturias.es/noticia/asturias/2017/01/25/asturias-paraiso-agricola-desaprovechado/00031485375319442960395.htm Gijón page on regional newspaper La voz de Asturias (the voice of Asturias) https://www.lavozdeasturias.es/gijon/ “Memorias culturales de un pasado industrial”, a film directed by University of Oviedo researchers Irene Díaz and Rubén Vega: https://fb.watch/hqSrwrwljl/ On radical unionism and the worker’s struggle in Spain: https://libcom.org/library/radical-unionism-workers-struggle-spain-ruben-vega-garcia-carlos-perez 

Pascale Gatzen fell in love with fashion as a child, became a designer and quickly fell out of love with the competitive, capitalistic fashion system. In New York she co-founded the workers cooperative Friends of Light that fabricated custom made woven jackets from local wool. This experience evolved into the Dutch ‘Linen Project’ an – also – cooperative attempt to create a value chain from growing organic flax to making linen products with the harvested and processed fibres. 

Collaboration comes with communication. Gatzen got interested in ‘empathic communication’ and made that the core of an artistic Master she set up in Arnhem, The Netherlands. 

A conversation about getting in touch with felt emotions and underlyning needs, ‘should thoughts’, the succesful Mondragon cooperative and the love for making beautiful things that will never fade.  

References:

The Linen Project https://thelinenproject.online/ Friends of Light weaving cooperative: https://www.friendsoflight.net/ Nice read: Take back Fashion! by Pascale Gatzen for Apria/ArteZ: https://apria.artez.nl/take-back-fashion/ About non-violent communication (what Pascale calls ‘compassionate communication’): https://www.cnvc.org/learn-nvc/what-is-nvc About the Mondragon worker cooperative: https://www.mondragon-corporation.com/en/about-us/ 

We decide to have the conversation in a parked car, with an enormous hand made world-of-wool-map on our lap. As if we are on an imaginary roadtrip through Cynthia Hathaway’s practise. It fits her way of working: creating fun, momentum and dialogue. Canadian born Hathaway came to the Netherlands in the late 90ies. She calls herself an artistic ‘searcher’ without the re- attached. Always looking for surprising angles and ways to connect different fields of working and thinking. From miniature trains to giant vegetables, from founding a disco in an academic institute to growing potatoes to embody Gilles Deleuze’s Rhizomatic thinking. Her latest intervention: a wool march. A walk with a herd of 250 sheep, shepherds and dogs straight through the centre of the Dutch textile city Tilburg. To raise awareness for lost connections between humans, animals and landscape. 

A talk about the art of not knowing, the dedication of amateurs, the loud Asturian hills, the global versus the local and the ongoing beat of disco music. Yeah. 

References:

More about Cynthia Hathaway: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAaNgIPbXvc More about Wool Alliance for Social Agency: https://woolallianceforsocialagency.blog/ System D Academy, Sandberg Instituut: https://sandberg.nl/system-d-academy The Department of Search (Zero Footprint Campus): http://www.hathawaydesigns.org/the-department-of-search.html 

We asked Chiara Sgaramella to join our Asturias edition because her practice as an artistic researcher focusses on the connection between art and agriculture. She was born and raised in the heel of Italy’s boot, but currently lives and works in Valencia, Spain. Sgaramella sees art as an integrated part of daily life, as a collective effort. From this perspective she studies the relations between soil, food and culture. We all know paella as a dish, but what do we know about rice production in Spain? When and how did rice arrive as a crop in Europe? Chiara developed a travelling trolley about the subject. 

A talk – that took place in the hazel forest close to PACA – about eco-feminist art, the Zapatistas, radical interdependency and the impact of scarcity. 

Immediately after the group talk (#8) Sgaramella needed leave for Piemonte, Italy, where she took part in a 1 year residency. Chiara worked with abandoned tools, found in a barn. She reproduced these ‘extensions of farmers hands’ in large prints, as an ode to agricultural gestures. 

References:

More about Chiara Sgaramella: https://chiarasgaramella.com/ About the symbolic association between Covadonga (a prechristian place of worship near  Picos de Europa) and the Spanish/catholic identity: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/his.2002.14.1-2.37 Another Possible World, exhibition including works by Zapatista in Museum Reina Sofiá: https://www.museoreinasofia.es/en/collection/room/room-00213 More about Chiara’s Oryza rice trolley: https://chiarasgaramella.com/oryza-collection ‘Dona arbre’, Fina Miralles, 197oies: https://www.macba.cat/en/art-artists/artists/miralles-fina/translacions-dona-arbre-documentacio-laccio-realitzada-novembre 

Ana Carreño takes us to public beach in Gijón/Xixon that is sandwiched between two industrial sites. While we look for a spot for our the interview we pass three women on a bench. One of them is singing. She says she used to sing a lot when she was young. Singing is a rural tradition. As a young woman she moved to the city for work and stopped singing. 

A job in the mines or the steel industry was an escape from rural poverty. But since the 80ies, when Spain joined the EU, mines were closed and industry declined. Architect and researcher Carreño studies the post industrial landscape. What happens when the activitity disappears, but memories and remnants are still present? This spatial confusion – or heterotopia as Michel Foucault calls it – comes with challenges and opportunities. Carreño grew up here, her grandfather drove the coal train from the mines in Aviles the harbour of Gijon. What kind of future does she picture for this shrinking city? How to deal with degrowth?

We dive into the economic history of the region and talk about the current spatial quality of the city. We look the revitalisation of Bilbao: from industrial community to cultural hub. But not every jobless mineworker can become a barista in a glossy coffeeshop. We also touch upon Ana’s own practise as an architect and artist. Does she consider Heterotopia as her habitat?

References:

More on Ana Carreño: https://anacarreno.com/ About ‘heteropías’ (plural places): https://anacarreno.com/Heterotopias More on regional singing: https://www.rtpa.es/video:De%20Romandela_551517181598.html 

Our guests, Ana Carreño, Chiara Sgaramella, Pascale Gatzen en Cynthia Hathaway have arrived. Before we dive into our 1 on 1 conversations, we try – as always – to truly arrive where we are. To ground, to temporarily root and sprout. To share this ‘vertical field trip’ we take you on a sonic tour. From Madrid's busy café's, to our cross-country train ride. Once you arrive in Asturias you witness a morning full of farm stuff and in the afternoon Ana Carreño takes us (and you dear listener!) on a silent sound walk through the industrial landscape that surrounds the farmhouse we stay in. And what a loud landscape it is! Enjoy. 

References:

More about PACA, Proyectos Artísticos Casa Antonino: https://pacaproyectosartisticos.com/ ‘Panera’ or ‘hórreo asturiano’ (raised granary barn): https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panera More about the blue vegetal dye harvested from Isatis Tinctoria: http://virginialopezvl.com/tierra-cuerpo-celeste/  Interesting read: ‘Nothing Compares to the Past. Industrial Decline and Socio-Cultural Change in Asturias’, by Rubén Vega and Matthew Kerry https://moving-the-social.ub.rub.de/index.php/MTS/article/view/8723 

We have arrived in Asturias! We stay in a wonderful former casería (farm house), turned into a residence: PACA, Projectos Artisticos Casa Antonino. Before our guests arrive we have time to walk around the premises and talk with Virginia López founder of PACA and our contextual guide for this week. 

But first: why are we here, in central Asturias, Spain, at the rural fringes of the (post)industrial city of Gijón/Xixón? We travelled here wondering if the strong working class identity of the region with its unions, strikes, and hard fought victories still lives on today, as the industrial decline that started in the 80ies, continues. At the same time, we see that tourism and leisure are becoming an important economic activity and ‘rewilding’ is high on the agenda of policy makers, making it food for marketeers who advertise Asturias as a ‘natural paradise’. Reality is obviously way more complex than a marketing slogan. Will the worker’s culture of solidarity be the social foundation for Asturias future? And can this future be a plural future – that doesn’t deny Asturias’ pastoral past and – more rural – ways of helping each other out?

In this talk we learn more about the region and reasons why Virginia returned to her home ground. A talk about forgotten connections between people, animals and crops and the confused state of the landscape as a result of this. We look at Virginia’s artistic practice and her role as placemaker. López sees herself as an outgoing swarm of bees and a solitude seeking hermit at the same time. Where will this paradox take her in the near future?

References:

Agropolitana exhibition: http://virginialopezvl.com/agropolitana/ Habitantes Paisajistas: https://pacaproyectosartisticos.com/living-landscape/habitantes-paisajistas/ Trailer of the Red Difusa documentary by Green Cube Network: https://vimeo.com/691132503 English summary of the publication ‘Culturarios · Humus De Iniciativas Culturales En El Campo’ (scroll down): https://culturarios.yolasite.com/culturarios-publicaci%C3%B3n-digital/ Concierto de Pitos y Flautas, by Fernando Oyágüez Reyes: https://agropolitana.wordpress.com/2021/06/27/pitos-y-flautas-26-junio-concierto-espicha/ 

Before we travel to Asturias, we decide to make a pitstop in Madrid and visit the headquarters of INLAND:  CAR, Centre For Approaching The Rural. Back in 2009, Fernando Garcia Dory started an agro-cutural-artistic community in Asturias. This was one of the reasons for us to set up our pluriversal camp in this region. This initiative evolved into a much bigger, international movement: INLAND/Campo Adentro, linking territory, culture and social change. While Fernando Dory travels the world to manifest and communicate the ideas of INLAND, Amelie Aranguren runs the Madrid office, which turns out to be much more than that. A house, a home, a neighourhood hub…

A talk about cheese as a narrative, transhumance, worthless wool, tensions around common pastures and foremost: making valuable and durable connections. 

References:

More about CAR (Centro de Acercamiento a lo rural): http://car.inland.org/ More about INLAND: https://inland.org/ 

During the exhibition In Search of the Pluriverse at Het Nieuwe Instituut (April-August 2022), artist, cook and weaver Aslı Hatipoğlu handed out sachets of sourdough culture, micro-organisms with which you can make dough for bread. To help all potential home-bakers getting started, but also because baking bread together is more fun and energy efficient, we organised two baking days in late spring and early summer. 

On a rainy day in June sourdough enthousiasts gather around the communal oven ‘De Stoker’ in Rotterdam neighbourhood Bospolder-Tussendijken. We talk, exchange, listen, learn, reflect and bake. Conclusion: bread is fundamental. Join us for 35 minutes of ‘bread time stories’. About microbes, time, the energy transition, community, poverty and sustainability.

In this podcast English and Dutch are both used. This edition came about as a collaboration between the Travelling Academy and Bakkerij De Eenvoud.    

More Aslı Hatipoğlu  (check her linktree) https://www.instagram.com/_aslihatipoglu Meer Huis van de Toekomst: https://www.huisvandetoekomst.org/ Meer bakkerij De Eenvoud http://www.bakkerij-de-eenvoud.nl/deschakel Heleen Eshuis’s initiatief: https://www.bosnodig.nl/

Artist, cook, boxer, musician and cultural producer Yemoh Odoi was fascinated as a child by the desert and its nomadic inhabitants. The silence, the space, the absence of people and references. He left Ghana at the age of 18 and travelled his way up to Casablanca via Senegal and the magnificent Sahara. 

He founded The Minority Globe to give voice to migrant identities through art. On our last day in Casa, the exhibition ‘Look at me’ opened. Photos of migrant women, taken by migrant women. “A migrant isn’t given anything. You’ve got to take. These women are taking their space.”

A talk about emptiness. About how the absence of ‘everything else’ brings out true creativity. As Yemoh says it: “In the desert you can only hear the songs that are composed in your heart”. 

References:

The Minority Globe https://theminorityglobe.org/ Look at me https://theminorityglobe.org/LOOK-AT-ME Yemoh Odoi on music as a cultural mediator https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpkVdVXbREY

As a kid Grocco  – artist name, his real name is a well kept secret – wanted to make a difference “I’m gonna be King of Casablanca!”.  He worked hard and became a grafitti legend. His tag Trick54 can be found all over Marocco and is unavoidable in the urban Casablanca area.  

Covid kept Grocco inside and he started to draw more. From his sketchbook, faces started to appear in the public domain. Ambivalent, yet tranquil faces, with holes and phallus-like bulges attached to them. Who is this creature? A visitor, is it Casablanca?

Recently even more enigmatic works appear in the streets of the city: three-dimensional fragments, compositions, carefully layed out on the pavement. Is it trash, are they messages, is it language? For Grocco everything is a trick. Life is a trick, art is a trick.  

Listen to a trickster who became a legend at the age of 30. 

References:

More on Grocco: https://www.instagram.com/_grocco_/ Grocco’s film: Untitled Life Experience https://consent.youtube.com/m?continue=https://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3Dd5X0soQI2lM%26cbrd%3D1&gl=NL&m=0&pc=yt&hl=nl&src=1

We meet at Musée Collectif with all participants of this ‘who owns the city’ edition: Mouna, Bodil, Rubén, Samba and Mohamed. Maria could not make it but is present in spirit. Some new voices join: street artist Grocco/Trick54 (more on him in talk #4 and #9), cultural producer Jamal Abdennassar (who Wong & Krier worked with in 201o) and artist/curator Yemoh Odoi (who organises artistic residencies for underrepresented members of the migrant population with his organisation The Minority Globe). Last but not least: Francien van Westrenen from Het Nieuwe Insitituut is also present in this circle of Casa-voices.

Musée Collectif is located close to a public fountain in Le parc de la Ligue Arabe. Miraculously our host Mohamed Faridji was able to turn it off, just for the length of this group talk. 

We share the experiences and conversations of the past days and try to make sense of it: Casablanca as phoenix that burns and rises from its ashes, over and over again. The city as amplifier of notions, movements and manifestations. This migrant city invites to start over, to let go of what was. But how to solidify, to secure things in the long term? How to activate a collective memory? At the end of the talk Mouna thanks the internet. Is that the place to store Casa’s memories?

References:

Les années de plomb (1956-1999, years of cultural repression) https://savoirs.rfi.fr/fr/comprendre-enrichir/histoire/maroc-les-annees-de-plomb Ancien théâtre municipal de Casablanca (1922-1984) https://www.geneanet.org/cartes-postales/view/347663#0 L’Uzine https://luzine.ma/ Casaprojecta http://casaprojecta.over-blog.com/ ICI Casa, Ville Inventive (2010) https://sophiekrier.com/portfolio/ici-casa-ville-inventive/

Mohamed Faridji co-founded Atelier de l’Observatoire in 2011, around the same time we – Wong & Krier – lived and worked in Casablanca for three months. At the time we did not meet, now we do. We were attracted by Le Musée Collectif (part of Atelier de l’Observatoire) a roaming museum, housed in sea container, presently located in Parc de la Ligue Arabe, which locals still call Parc Yasmina. Faridji is an artist/activist who attempts to cultivate a collective cultural memory of Casa: Is an obsolete polyester Mickey Mouse with one ear missing a piece of trash, or does it have cultural value? Faridji tries to answer this question by collecting, archiving and displaying cultural artefacts like this one-eared Mickey. His approach is inclusive, participatory and citizen driven. We chose the Musée Collectif as location for our final group talk. 

We meet in the parc, where Sophie’s brain needs to work twice as hard as in in other talks: Mohamed speaks French, Krier interviews and translates at the same time. Well done, both Sophie and Mohamed!

A talk about the absence of constructive cultural policy, cultural rights and how to deal with that. How to keep institutions that disappear – like the Casablanca Aquarium – present in the shared Casa memory? How to activate the imagination that is linked to those memories? Why? Faridji: “We need to celebrate humanity”. 

References:

Atelier de L’observatoire, Musée Collectif https://www.atelierobservatoire.com/musee-collectif L’Aquarium imaginaire https://www.atelierobservatoire.com/aquarium Parc Yasmina https://www.atelierobservatoire.com/musee-collectif-parc-yasmina

After taking us to Lac d’Oulfa, Sidi Moumen and Hay Mohammedi for our vertical field trip (talk #2), today Samba Soumbounou brings us to the neighbourhood where he first settled in Casa, arriving from Mauretania 10 years ago. He is a cultural engineer and mediator: connecting dots and making these connections meaningful and productive. Samba is the embodiment of social glue, extremely approachable, always willing to ‘step in’. During our stay his phone rings frequently and many people stop him in the streets to ask something or to just say hi. It earned him the hashtag #letscallsamba!

We talk about the divide between people and policy making: the lack of communication. It makes sense that this topic matters to Samba. In Mauretania the Soumbounou family is responsible for the collective memory: to pass things on. His family is also associated with playing the drum. In Mauritanian culture the drum connects and harmonises. In Casablanca there is a lot to harmonise – capital investors, builders, politics, citizens: they don’t communicate well. In the end the city is determined by people, not buildings. It is not about the ‘what’. It is about the ‘who’ and ‘how’. 

References:

Kandara’Lab : Villes - Culture - Patrimoine (Samba Soumbounou, field trip guide) https://www.facebook.com/kandaralab/?modal=admin_todo_tour Afrikayna, foundation for pan-african mobility https://afrikayna.com/mobilite-artistique/ Café Espace de l’enfant, au parc la foret vert http://maps.app.goo.gl/RbPBJFPZkETkeNbEA?g_st=iw 

Bodil Ouédraogo was born and raised in Amsterdam by a Dutch mother and a father from Burkina Faso. As a human being and as a designer she cherishes her bi-cultural background. She studies it, she materialises it. In her own words: “I have no choice, my identity cannot be ignored.” 

After an interesting fashion walk through Casa with Mouna Belgrini, we end up in the courtyard of a fabric store in wholesale district Derb Omar. Apart from the background noise an interesting context for our conversation. We talk about the art of dressing up and how combining different existing layers can form brand new identities. Ouédragaogo just came from Burkina Faso and Nigeria and she reflects on idea howt different cultures activate different types of (creative) thinking. We also talk about the classic ‘grand boubou’ as inspiration and the interesting properties of latex. Through the eyes of Bodil everything is related to identity: from a spray painted name tag in the streets to (fake) louis vuitton bags. After the talk we go shopping for home accessories. Because life = work = life. 

References:

More on Bodil Ouédraogo https://www.bodilouedraogo.com/ Cafe Antic https://www.google.com/maps/place/Caf%C3%A9+Antic+Palais/@33.5930385,-7.6169649,15z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x308f6d8a5b65d8b6!8m2!3d33.5930385!4d-7.6169649 Bram Owusu https://soundcloud.com/bkowusu Alára Lagos https://www.instagram.com/alaralagos/ Waffles N Cream https://www.wafflesncream.com 

Mouna Belgrini is the perfect tour guide: she knows Casablanca in and out, and she effortlessly connects places, facts and narratives. We could have roamed the city for weeks, but had to limit ourselves to a sublime day of walking and talking. Belgrini is a (photo)journalist, cultural producer and communicator. On a practical level this means Mouna is connecting, editing and distributing content 24/7. We talk about how she learned to live in this complex city, we talk about fear and joy, we look at street art and reflect on the impact the pandemic had on daily life in Casablanca.

When we arrive at her apartment, we dive into what Mouna loves most: dance. From the moment she laid eyes on street dancers at art space L’Uzine, to creating a new space – both digital and physical – for creative energy/dance: Liquid Bridge. 

We end the talk with a tour through digital Casablanca. What has a platform like Instagram brought to the city? And what does the future have in store for young – digital – personalities? Will they go, or are they here to stay?

References:

Kabareh Cheikhats https://www.instagram.com/kabarehcheikhats/ Grocco/Trick54 https://www.instagram.com/_grocco_/ Liquid Bridge https://www.instagram.com/liquid.bridge/ Casa soccer team Red https://www.instagram.com/wacofficiel/ Casa soccer team Green https://www.instagram.com/rcaofficiel/ Karim Chater https://www.instagram.com/style_beldi/ Cheb Pablo Size M https://www.instagram.com/latal3a/ 

Rotterdam based photographer Rubén Dario Kleimeer portrays the urban landscape and the people inhabiting it. He uses the medium photography to analyse and better understand urban spaces. With the gaze of an urban ethnographer, he explores the built environment in which we live, work and dwell. 

Kleimeer picked the spot for our conversation: Place des Nation Unies, a spacious square where different networks of transportation cross. At the far end of the square, in the shade of a tree, we talk about photography in relation to time and space. If you take a lot of time to make a picture, is that time reflected in the image? Does that image last longer than an instant snapshot? What places in the city is Kleimeer interested in? And what is the perfect perspective, angle to photograph them from? 

Four months after our talk we meet again in Rotterdam, to take a closer look at the photos Rubén took during our days in Casa. Do these pictures last?

References:

More on Rubén Dario Kleimeer https://www.rubendariokleimeer.com/ Anfa Park https://www.instagram.com/anfa_park/ Casablanca Tramway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casablanca_Tramway Best drummers https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/100-greatest-drummers-of-all-time-77933/ 

In the meantime all four participants/makers of this Casablanca edition have arrived: Bodil Ouédraogo, Rubén Dario Kleimeer, Mouna Belgrini and Samba Soumbounou. Next to local insider Maria Daïf, Francien van Westrenen from Het Nieuwe Instituut joins us for the five day programme that in the end results in this series of conversations, but kicks off with a ‘vertical field trip’. An attempt to ground ourselves and be truly present in the Casablanca ‘here and now’.

Samba Soumbounou and Mouna Belgrini take us on a dazzling tour. We start in Firdaouss, a quiet small scale neighbourhood at the west side of the city, bordered by Lac El Oulfa, a former stone quarry, now an artificial lake. We pick up trash at the shore, circle the lake and have lunch at the central square. At the borders of the lake the pressure of commericial development is tangible. Samba took us here because he works in collaboration with the citizens, trying to improve the quality of public space. 

In the evening we take the tram to Sidi Moumen and Hay Mohammedi at the east side of Casa, two vibrant working class neighbourhoods. We visit a cultural centre, a local market and take a peek at colonial architectural heritage, that over the years is ‘decolonised’ by its inhabitants. 

This soundscape tries to capture the moods, sounds, views and smells of the day that made a big impression on all of us. 

References:

Bruit du frigo (urban creation collective) at Lac d’Oulfa https://bruitdufrigo.com/en/projets/fiche/la-fabrique-du-lac/   Subsaharan migrants in Morocco https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/growing-destination-sub-saharan-africans-morocco Les Etoiles de Sidi Moumen, cultural centre https://english.alaraby.co.uk/features/moroccos-sidi-moumen-cultural-centre-changing-futures-and-perceptions Hay Mohammadi: a re-appropriated modernist neighborhood https://www.thepolisblog.org/2012/07/adaptations-of-vernacular-modernism.html

In 2010, we  – Wong & Krier – lived and worked for three months in Casa, as locals call Casablanca. Aim was to embrace the city as a place of production and to make a portrait of its hidden qualities: We named it: ICI Casa, Ville Inventive. The resulting exhibition was an optimistic tribute to the resourcefulness of a thriving city. Many questions however were left unanswered once the residency was over: for instance the fragility and invisibility of the – quite substantial –  informal economy, and the gentrification of the city through capital investors, materialised in luxury shopping malls. More than ten years and a pandemic later, we return to Casa, in search of who makes the city, who owns it, and who is granted access to it. 

We start this series of conversations with our local insider Maria Daïf. Maria spent 15 years as a cultural journalist (print and radio), then turned to cultural mediation, supporting independent art projects throughout the African/Arabic region. She is a fire starter, curator, writer and an important voice in contemporary Casablanca. 

We meet Maria at the seaside, where we look out on the beach, an obsolete concrete swimming pool and the Atlantic Ocean. We talk about the late 90ies, early 2000s when King Mohammed VI took over from his father Hassan II, Moroccan society opened up and Maria’s career as a journalist blossomed. We also talk about the complicated dance between the authority, the rules and the people. Maria describes the difficult cultural climate: how things come, go and come again. 

A talk about the past, present and future of a city that Daïf loves, and is about to leave. A new rural existence lingers beyond the horizon. 

References:

Magazine: Femmes du Marcoc https://femmesdumaroc.com/ Magazine: TELQUEL https://telquel.ma/ Creative collective Skefkef https://www.instagram.com/skefkefmag/ Art/cutural space L’Uzine https://luzine.ma/ ICI Casa, Ville Inventive (2010) https://sophiekrier.com/portfolio/ici-casa-ville-inventive/

Imagine a cold, dark and rainy afternoon in November. The group (Dimitrova, Espinosa, Zahn, Wong, Krier and audiotechnician Robert) gathers under an old amusement park bumper-car-roof. We wear silent headphones with discolights. We are in the shadows of Haus der Statistik, that houses artistic and research based projects during its renovation. We use a score by Mia Habib and walk clockwise in circles. Robert stands in the middle, holding the mic. 

A walking, searching conversation that covers most subjects we touched upon these past few days: fluidity, violence, urban capitalism, the relation between body, city and health. The tone of the conversation is committed yet bleak. At the end Sophie lights up the space by quoting Puddles the Pelican: “It’s gonna be alright, even if it’s not gonna be alright”. 

References:

Glossary of Urban Praxis, Werkstätte Berlin, 2022: https://www.urbanepraxis.berlin/glossary-of-urban-praxis/?lang=en Modellprojekt Haus der Statistik: https://hausderstatistik.org Mia Habib: All, a physical form of protest: https://www.miahabib.com/?portfolio=all-a-physical-poem-of-protest Beyoncé, Formation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDZJPJV__bQ Body of Bodies, Stadterweitern: https://stadterweitern.de/publication A pluralistic universe, William James, 1908: https://journals.openedition.org/ejpap/756 Neue Kreuzberger Kunstverein: https://www.nbk.org/de Jeremy Wade aka Puddles the Pelican: https://showdownpodcast.podigee.io/69-new-episode

We do realise that outside our hyperfocused Berlin bubble, this city hosts many other lives and voices that deserve to be heared and recognised. And that is why – in this short intermission – we make room for Doreen, Vasille, Fluss Puss and Johanna, Berliners we met while walking the streets. What does fluidity mean to them? What brought them here? Who exactly is Berlin?

Berlin Pigeons: https://www.exberliner.com/berlin/berlin-pigeons/ Fluss Pluss: https://soundcloud.com/flusspluss 

Sabine Zahn lives and works in Berlin. She investigates how choreographic strategies can help understand how urban space can be lived, expressed and transformed. She creates public research projects and processes which are often based on scripts that set something – often bodies – in motion. In 2021, Sabine was appointed a fellow in the DAS Graduate programme in Amsterdam.

We had this conversation at Floating University, a place for learning and experiment in a neglected water basin at the fringe of Kreuzberg. Zahn thrives in places like this, where new ways of living and being – human and more than human – can be tried out and ‘rehearsed’.  A talk at dusk, when the light faded and the cold started to creep in. A conversation about the body as a tool to understand words, and words as the start of a choreography. 

References:

Floating University Berlin: https://floating-berlin.org/ Fremdgehen: http://www.lovelabours.net/ Stadterweitern: https://stadterweitern.de/publication DAS Graduate Programme: https://www.atd.ahk.nl/das-research/third/third-cohorts/sabine-zahn/ 

Tomás Espinosa is artist and activist. He works in both in Berlin and Bogotá. The tension between the ‘intimate’ and the ‘public’ fuels his work. He installed two hanging mirrors with holes in a Berlin park, where men meet for sex. He filmed the installation and put a soundscape under it in which you hear Espinosa cruising through the greenery, making contact with other male bodies. Is this a disturbance of a secretive meeting place, or an attempt to emancipate? He took this installation to Bogotá where he engages since 2015 with La Red Comunitaria Trans, a trans activist network. Together they develop actions, performances and videos. 

A talk on a crisp, cold morning about fighting violence, having sex in public places, the urgency of protest, the worth of a life and the darker sides of fluidity. 

References:

Tomás Espinosa: https://www.tomasespinosa.com La Red Comunitaria Trans: https://redcomunitariatrans.org Cruising: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruising_for_sex Necropolitics, Achille Mbembe: https://criticallegalthinking.com/2020/03/02/achille-mbembe-necropolitics/ 

Architectural researcher Kornelia Dimitrova co-founded Foundation We Are, a collective of nine creative minds and makers. We had a Warming Up Talk in 2020 with Kornelia and her co-founder Bernhard Lenger. Dimitrova’s analytic and bright approach of the built environment and social dynamics stuck with us, so we asked her to join us for our Berlin edition. In her own practice Dimitrova helps care organisations to address spatial and architectural issues by imagining alternative scenarios for use. In the past years she developed a strategic vision for De Grote Beek, one of the largest mental healthcare facilities in the Netherlands. Kornelia published her proposals in the Playbook for Healing Environments. 

A talk – with a blazing fire in the background – about the value of mapping, working with what there is, and the art of proposing the right possibilities at the right time. 

References:

Kornelia Dimitrova: https://www.kodimitrova.com/ The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, Berlin (1919-1933): https://magnus-hirschfeld.de/ausstellungen/institute/ Sectie C Eindhoven: https://www.sectie-c.com/site/ Stock photography: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_photography 

We start every pluriversal trip with a joined experience: a vertical fieldtrip, or an ‘acupuncture of place’ as Sophie Krier calls it. Guided by participant Sabine Zahn we (Tomás Espinosa, Kornelia Dimitrova, Benoît Verjat, Sophie Krier and Erik Wong) attempt to ‘feel’ one of the oldest, but now quite nondescript parts of Berlin: Fisherinsel. Sabine invites us to use our whole body and all our senses. We start at motor ship Heimatland that houses Hošek Contemporary, a residency/studio space that functions as our home base. 

We walk, jump, stumble, roll, smell, touch, listen and observe. At the end you can listen to some personal audio notes. A very physical start of our fluid trip.

References:

Fisherinsel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischerinsel Hošek Contemporary: https://www.hosekcontemporary.com Bei Lydia: https://www.tripadvisor.ie/Restaurant_Review-g187323-d15036865-Reviews-Bei_Lydia-Berlin.html 

Although in time it was our last conversation, we decided to start this string of talks with Daan van Kampenhout. His take on fluidity is inspiring and a perfect introduction to our series ‘Fluid selves, fluid Berlin’.

Van Kampenhout’s interest in shamanism started after having vidid dreams during a malaria infection. He graduated from art school with a series of costumes and rituals. After a life of travel, learning, publishing and teaching, Van Kampenhout still combines his ritualistic, systemic practice with designing costumes and performing. A talk on a quiet winter day about antidotes for hate, mediating between matter and spirit, a queer ancestors ritual and the importance of Berlin’s KitKatClub as a fun, fluid techno temple. 

References:

Daan van Kampenhout: https://daanvankampenhout.com/ Bert Hellinger: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Hellinger Stretch Festival/Village: https://www.stretch.berlin/ Radical Faeries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_Faeries KitKatClub: https://www.kitkatclub.org/ 

Ghanaian-Filipino architectural scientist Mae-ling Lokko is active in the field of biomaterials. A recent work discussed in this talk is Thresholds of Return, a gate made of waste from the Ghanian coconut industry. It is a reconstruction of the Door of No Return in Elmina (Ghana), through which the enslaved were led out of Africa. Wong & Krier got to know about Lokko’s work in Mull through Tom Morton (Arc Architects), with whom she designed an ‘open air classroom’ for the Future by Design Cove park residency in the lead up to COP26.

Designer and researcher Henriëtte Waal co-initiated Atelier Luma, an experimental design laboratory in Arles, France, in 2016. Among other programs, Waal helped set up a residency programme there for designers, which is how she first met Lokko. Waal’s system-level projects integrate design, community and ecology and involve collaborations with scientists, communities, an international network of makers, and students.

In this joyful and at times technical Friday afternoon talk, Lokko and Waal share memories and insights about food as a community binder and talk about practices of hardscaping versus ‘mounding’ (contouring permeable earth) to resolve water circulation problems in cities. Mae-ling introduces the idea/theory of generative justice (the bottom up creation, translation and circulation of value) and very vividly describes her recent installation Thresholds of Return. Henriette chimes in when ‘bioregional design’ come to the table: localty and Co2 footprint are easily overlooked in biobased design. Let’s start from the feet up. 

https://henriettewaal.com/about/ www.z33.be/en/programma/mae-ling-lokko/

Just before we left we handed all the sounds we recorded along the way, over to sound engineer Martin Low. He mixed it into this soundscape. The last pearl of the string. Thank you Martin, Mull and everyone we’ve met along the way.

Aslı Hatipoğlu is weaver, researcher and cook. “By cooking in specific environments, and engaging with people from different cultural backgrounds, I run into stories, which lead me to subjects such as history, psychology, spirituality, ecology and science. I translate these stories into textiles or printed edible materials, and curate dinners around these topics, making use of the social interaction that takes place when we eat together.” Sadly enough Aslı could not join us on Mull, so Erik looked her up in Maastricht where she was a participant at Jan van Eyck Academie, a post graduate programme for art, design and reflection. A talk about cooking, recipes, the locality of food and culture, our relationships with microbes and the deeper understanding of life they provide. 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’. It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

After all these 1 on 1’s with our hosts Miek and Rutger, the neighbours, and guests Tim & Reiko, Tom and Anne it is time to listen, share and discuss in a larger local context. We invited more local voices: theater director Rebecca Atkinson-Lord (Tobermory), new generation Mull crofter Renatus Derbidge, Oban-based curator Naoko Mabon, artist Mhairi Killin (Iona) and fiddle player and researcher for South West Mull and Iona Development (SWID) Hanna Fischer. Neighbour Judy Gibson was present, Jimmy and John were too busy at their farms. We (Erik & Sophie) scripted this talk in many ways, but in the end we decided to just give the floor to the participants. We set up a circle, introduced the guests and a ‘talking stick’ and talked in two rounds: Round & About radio, based on the monthly local news magazine with the same name. 

A long and horizontal talk about sourdough cultures, the (local) food economy, the big and complex question of how to thrive, the pain of ‘the 1750-1860 Highlands and Island Clearances’, the effects of tourism on the precarious housing situation and much more. And what about that swan that needed to be rescued? Sit back, go for a walk, or do the dishes and listen. This is the closest to Mull we can bring you. Special thanks to Hannah for playing the tune and Martin Low for making everyone very audible. 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us. This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

It is Anne van Leeuwen’s personal mission to bring about regenerative crossovers between nature and culture and to translate these into concrete projects and propositions. Part of this effort involves creating a constructive dialogue between scientists, artists, business persons, politicians, citizens and wherever possible non-humans. In the past years she co-founded the collective Embassy of the North Sea, which departs from the starting point that the sea owns itself. Their podcast series Voices of the North Sea explores this point of view. Anne – her energy seems endless – is also the co-founder of Bodemzicht, a regenerative farm and learning place. Eaten alive by the migets Anne and Erik talk about birds with a part-time zoo contract, the importance of listening to the sea, and those damn boxes you keep running into when you want to work in a true relational way with our surroundings.

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’. It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

Architect Tom Morton founded ARC, a small architectural practice based in a former candle-making workshop in Cupar, Fife, in the east of Scotland. Its nature-based work transcends architectural practice to encompass diverse creative and learning activities such as repairing mud walls, communicating material physics, and building festivals. Erik meets up with Tom in a 19th century lighthouse-builders-home on Erraid. They look out of the window. It looks empty, but what is emptiness? It is a very subjective, loaded word in this fringe of the UK: Tom, some context please! In this meandering talk they touch upon the concept of time and his recent collaboration with Ghanaian designer Mae-ling Lokko for the Future by Design Cove park residency, located one hour from Glasgow, overlooking Scotland’s Loch Long.

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

Scotland-based artist duo Collins+Goto Studio (Tim Collins and Reiko Goto) are known for their long-term projects that involve socially engaged environmental research and practice in both the USA and the UK. In 2019, after ten years of research, they launched the Plein Air LP, featuring Scotland-based recordings with the help of a plant-driven synthesizer. Sophie meets up with Tim and Reiko on a rainy grey morning. How can we feel empathy with nature? How can we understand other-than-human life forms without speaking their language? And how will this deeper understanding affect us as humans? A talk about peat, post industrial Pittsburgh, the breath of a leave and a horse called Darkness. We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

In the meantime our guests from the Netherlands and Scotland have arrived: Anne van Leeuwen, Tom Morton, Tim Collins & Reiko Goto. Unfortunately our fifth guest Aslı Hatipoğlu bumped into the invisible Nation State wall and didn’t make it further than Schiphol airport. Her talk is the last one in this series, we looked her up in Maastricht when we got back.  Before we dive into 1 on 1 talks, we went for a ‘vertical field trip’. A communal effort to really relate to where we are. With skipper Mark Jardine we sailed to a remote beach at the south side of nature reserve Tireragan, to cl ean up accumulated plastic waste. In this delightfully slow paced talk, Mark and his son Stewart tell about living and working at the edge of the ocean, the island economy, the relation with their ship and the art of avoiding danger. So close your eyes and smell the ocean. We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’. It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy!  For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

A bit further down the road lives Jimmy Campbell, the third neighbour we talked to. Apart from taking care of 600 sheep, Jimmy and his wife Christine run a succesful camping site, soon to be taken over his daughter and son in law. A talk about sheep that eat seaweed, the changing flow of tourists, the ultra low market price for wool, and helping each other out as neighbours. 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl 

Judy Gibson spent all her childhood summers on the Isle of Erraid. 5 years ago she relocated here permanently. She shares the island – or tidal island – with the spiritual Findhorn community. Despite living across a narrow strip of sea, Judy is one of Miek and Rutger’s closest neighbours. A talk about community work, her father – Tony Gibson’s – legacy, and the inevitable effects of climate change on daily life. 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl 

John and Linda Cameron live at Knockvologan 1, next door to where Miek and Rutger live. This is where the Ross of Mull ends, or begins. Camper drivers are often suprised by this fact and have to turn around, or… decide to spend the night on the land of the Camerons. John has lived here all his life, takes care of sheep and cows and drives his ‘quad’ with visible pleasure. A talk about being a crofter, the quality of grass, the deer problem, and cows that go on vacation to neighbour Jimmy’s pastures. 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy! 

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating: go to pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl 

While Erik and Miek are hiking, Sophie joins Rutger at his morning routine of baking bread. It took him more than a year to get it right: to build a productive relation with the sourdough culture that helps him bake the bread. As a bonus Rutgers shows the ‘barn in a barn’ that he has been building for the past two years. We give you two words: pig manure and resilience.

Rutger Emmelkamp is an artist, teacher and program maker. He connects art, historical and deep ecology theory with film, literature, theater and crafts. In parallel, Rutger has been teaching in various art disciplines for more than ten years and was appointed head of the Jewellery Department at the Rietveld Academie Amsterdam in 2013 – a position he resigned from to dedicate his artistic practice and making skills to Knockvologan in 2017. 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us. This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’. It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy!

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating, go to the web magazine: pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl .

Early Birds Miek and Erik go for a walk and enter a magical world. Eaten alive by the midges they talk about how much we don’t know and how Miek finds words for things she sees: by looking at them over and over and over again. As a bonus Miek reads the poem ‘Oaks at Knockvologan’ bij local poet Derek Crook.

Miek Zwamborn is an artist, novelist, book maker and translator. Whilst carrying out field research, she travels through time and space. By intertwining her observations with local history and scientific research on flora & fauna, she creates stories in which drawings, sculptures, raw material and books play a crucial role. She published among others a poetic anthology on seaweeds, The Seaweed Collector’s Handbook (Profile, 2020). 

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’. It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy!

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating, go to the web magazine: pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

Finally: after a warming up that took us longer than expected, we take you to the weather beaten, Scottish Isle of Mull. And how better to arrive than meeting our hosts Miek and Rutger. Two Dutch artists who decided to move to the southern tip of the island. There, surrounded by sea, sheep, bog and a nature reserve, they worked the past five years to build, stumble, fall, getting up and getting connected. We meet them at a moment when surviving slowly turns into thriving. The ‘dance of daily life’ becomes smoother and their artist in residency program Knockvologan is gaining momentum. These two are not going anywhere, they are here to stay. But, have they arrived yet?

We were inspired and overwhelmed by Mull and everything the island contains and shared with us.  This is one of 13 talks. We edited it like ‘a string of pearls’ It works best to jump from one pearl to the next, starting at the beginning… Enjoy!

For more context and information about our search for the pluriverse and the upcoming exhibition we are curating, go to the web magazine: pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl

On the weather-beaten island of Mull, off the west coast of Scotland, two artists from the Netherlands set up camp, taking a vow to “work with the elements, not fight them”. Over time they grew a garden, a seasonal residency programme and a neighbourhood barn-in-a-barn. How to thrive and make kin with other humans and non-humans in such a remote place, year-round? The team of In Search of the Pluriverse will find out by temporarily relocating to this northern edge of Europe.

Wong & Krier needed some more context before they left for the UK, Scotland, Mull. To touch base before the actual travel. They choose for a climate/activist perspective – Climate conference COP26, Glasgow is coming up in November – and they wanted to gain more insight in economic/political innovation at a local/community level in the UK. Listen to their conversations with Suzanne Dhaliwal and Jay Tompt.

Jay Tompt is a lecturer in the MA Regenerative Economics at Schumacher College and co-founder of the Totnes REconomy Project (UK), for which he regularly delivers trainings in transition. A ‘political entrepreneur with California style enthusiasm’. Jay works as an executive, consultant, activist and writer. His areas of expertise include citizen-led economics, ethical consuming, green supply chain and waste reduction. A talk about the marginal position of local politics in the UK, the come back of the commons, about the potential of dragons and the power of participation. Listen to an insider who plays the outsider-card whenever needed. 

References

• Totnes REconomy Project reconomycentre.org/
• Local Spark Torbay localsparktorbay.org/
• Schumacher College, MA Regenerative Economics www.schumachercollege.org.uk/ campus.dartington.org/regenerative-economics/
• On Making the Yes and the No, with Jay Jordan and Isa Frémeaux Hetnieuweinstituut – Warming-up-to-the-pluriverse-8-on-making-the-yes-and-the-no
• The 1999 Battle in Seattle against WTO rules of trade www.seattle.gov/cityarchives/exhi…otests-in-seattle
• Anti and alter globalisation movement www.dw.com/en/a-brief-history-…movement/g-39573255
• World Social Forum wsf2021.net/
• Transition Town movement, Totnes www.transitiontowntotnes.org/ transitionnetwork.org/
• Scotland’s independence movement www.cfr.org/in-brief/whats-next…dependence-movement
• Flatpack democracy: power tools for reclaiming local politics www.flatpackdemocracy.co.uk
• On the Welfare State, and its start in Darlington www.centreforwelfarereform.org/library/r…stem.html
• Open Space method www.mind.org.uk/media-a/4924/open-space-method.pdf
• The Local Entrepreneur Forum and the Community of Dragons reconomycentre.org/home/lef/
• Brexit slogan “Getting back control” www.irishtimes.com/culture/take-ba…urope-1.3824393
• The Dragons’ Den TV show www.youtube.com/channel/UCDAzmE9V4Xw5CdLkn3pvO3A
• Myrtle Cooper, Wild & Curious wildandcurious.org.uk
• Incredible Edibles www.incredibleedible.org.uk/
• Incredible Farm incrediblefarm.co.uk/
• Community Interest Company (CiC) www.gov.uk/government/publicat…report-2020-to-2021
• Community Benefit Society (CBS) www.mondaq.com/uk/charities-non-…y-benefit-society
• Guerilla Gardening www.guerrillagardening.org/
• On relocalisation as a permaculture principle: David Holmgren, Pathways to Sustainability store.holmgren.com.au/product/princi…-and-pathways/
• Biogregionalism: becoming native to a place cascadiabioregion.org/what-is-bioregionalism

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

On the weather-beaten island of Mull, off the west coast of Scotland, two artists from the Netherlands set up camp, taking a vow to “work with the elements, not fight them”. Over time they grew a garden, a seasonal residency programme and a neighbourhood barn-in-a-barn. How to thrive and make kin with other humans and non-humans in such a remote place, year round? The team of In Search of the Pluriverse will find out by temporarily relocating to this northern edge of Europe.

Wong & Krier needed some more context before they left for the UK, Scotland, Mull. To touch base before the actual travel. They choose for a climate/activist perspective – Climate conference COP26, Glasgow is coming up in November – and they wanted to gain more insight in economic/political innovation at a local/community level in the UK. Listen to their conversations with Suzanne Dhaliwal and Jay Tompt.

Suzanne Dhaliwal is ‘climate justice campaigner’ and artist. She was part of the Art Not Oil coalition, challenging BP and Shell's corporate sponsorship in the arts, and strives for more inclusivity within the climate movement. Because: Why is Britain’s green movement still an all white affair? Brexit, the pandemic and ‘activist fatigue’ made Dhaliwal relocate to Croatia recently, from where she continues her work. A talk about making privileges productive, a megaphone as listening tool, and the power of making the absent present.

References

• www.suzannedhaliwal.org/
• Why are Britain’s Green Movements an All White Affair www.theguardian.com/environment/201…ll-white-affair
• MA Social Sculpture in the Arts, Oxford
www.social-sculpture.org/taught-maste…sculpture-2/
• MA Ecology Futures, AKV St Joost www.akvstjoostmasters.nl/programmes/e…logy-futures
• No Tar: Sands (Canada) www.no-tar-sands.org/
• Zapatistas set sail for Europe in a gesture of solidarity www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/…y-and-rebellion
• Laing Olivia. The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone, Picador: 2016 www.olivialaing.com/
• Bus sculpture by British-Nigerian artist Sokari Douglas-Camp www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-34777859
• Jon Daniel (1966-2017), columnist, independent creative director and social activist www.designweek.co.uk/issues/16-22-o…iel-1966-2017/
• UK COP 26. COP stands for Conference of the Parties. Parties are the signatories of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) - a treaty agreed in 1994 which has 197 Parties (196 countries and the EU). ukcop26.org/
• Have you read the IPCC report? “The IPCC embodies a unique opportunity to provide rigorous and balanced scientific information to decision-makers because of its scientific and intergovernmental nature.” www.ipcc.ch/assessment-report/ar6/

Further reading/listening

• Serpentine podcast  Back to Earth: How do we get there? (Suzanne intervenes at 12 min).
• Mothers of Invention podcast “Climate change is a man-made problem. With a feminist solution!” www.mothersofinvention.online/

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

As part of the podcast episode Testing İstanbul’s Waters, impact maker and Dutch politician with Kurdish roots Kıvılcım Özmen shares the stories of her grandmother Besê Diribaş (1915-1996) about the layered meaning of water in Dersim. Eastern Anatolia has been home to many Kurds for centuries. Some continue to live there even after the Dersim massacre (1937-1938). Slow down, and let this circular tale of belonging cradle you. The original story is by Kıvılcım Özmen; the English narration is by İlke Ercan; and the song Ferfecir is by Metin and Kemal Kahraman. Many thanks to Ayşe Gül Altınay and Gülser İlgan who helped shine a light on Kurdish Alevism.

In four short audio notes, Sophie and Erik reflect on the Thirst Talk. Sophie brings in Arturo Escobar’s writings and Erik announces an epilogue of our İstanbul adventure…

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

With designer Nur Horsanalı, urbanist Yaşar Adnan Adanalı, river mobiliser Li An Phoa and architect Eva Pfannes from OOZE.

Finally Sophie and Erik meet up with Nur Horsanalı, Yaşar Adnan Adanalı, Eva Pfannes from OOZE and Li An Phoa at the same time, in virtual space. After a synchronised one hour walk, following the THIRST WALK instructions Sophie wrote, we meet online in public space. Calling in from İstanbul, Rotterdam, Amsterdam and The Hague. Accompanied by the sound of mosques, playing children and a Dutch breeze, we talk about water inside and outside our bodies, about water as infrastructure, as lifeline, as disappointment, as part of our practice and as a continuous flow that connects everything and everybody across generations.

Cited references

• Vliet Canal, The Hague, Netherlands, dated back to 47 AD en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vliet_(canal)
• Taksim Square fountain, Beyoğlu, İstanbul artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/taks…ICzpgA-6ypJg
• 2013 Gezi protests bianet.org/english/crisis/1515…i-resistance-report
• Çesme (public fountain) www.ktb.gov.tr/EN-113835/fountai…man-istanbul.html
• Thirst Walk Instructions (Exercise #4) pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/en/exercises
• Amstel river, Amsterdam en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstel
• Hamidiye bottled water hamidiye.istanbul/
• Ayazağa Creek, Sarıyer/Istanbul 41.114407, 28.998969
• Hefbrug Rotterdam rotterdammakeithappen.nl/en/media-obj…the-hefbrug/
• Rhine Watershed en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_watershed
• Vortex (the etymological root of the word vertical) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vortex
• Delta en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_delta
• Trekvaart www.britannica.com/topic/Trekvaart
• Swimming in the Maas www.rotterdamcityblog.com/city-rotterd…m-swim-2015/
• Swimming in the Bosphorus www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0WEHmZl5nk
• Animal çesme (automated style) www.tuzla.bel.tr/icerik/888/7188/…-su-otomati.aspx
• Bird architecture (Ottoman bird houses) www.cnnturk.com/yasam/osmanlinin-kus-koskleri
• Center for Spatial Justice roof garden @ysrdnl www.instagram.com/p/CNM8zQwAkof

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this extra Thirst Talk, Sophie crosses – virtual – paths with engineer and artist Serkan Taycan who initiated the Between Two Seas Walk: an artwork, a heritage walk and an open air laboratory at the same time. By combining the notion of engineering with an artistic practice, Taycan tries to make us aware of how spatial decision-making can have enormous cultural and ecological consequences.

Cited references

• Serkan Taycan www.serkantaycan.com/
• A Wall of Water (5’48’’), Serkan Taycan, 2018
• İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu says only a handful of people will benefit from the Kanal Istanbul project.
• bianet.org/english/environment…al-istanbul-project
• Between Two Seas cultureroutesinturkey.com/between-two-seas/
• Gezi Park protests, 2013 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gezi_Park_protests
• Ece Uzmay Asya, “Hydropolitics and Water Geographies of Istanbul” (master thesis), Kadir Has University, July 2019 (unpublished). See Ece Uzmay Asya, “ The 1970 Cholera Epidemic in Sağmalcılar: Unveiling the Entangled Water Relations of Istanbul”, İstanbul Unbound Conference, 2021 (replay starts around 39 minutes)
• www.crowdcast.io/e/istanbul-unbound/8
• Lignite Mining in Turkey www.gem.wiki/Turkey_and_coal

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In Thirst Talk #4, Sophie meets up with urbanist and İstanbulite Yaşar Adnan Adanalı. A talk about how all spatial issues have social consequences. Also the idea of walking as a way to produce knowledge and the importance of ‘scale’ pop up during this short, animated talk.

Cited references

• Yaşar Adnan Adanalı yasaradanali.com
• Infected Cities Series dutchculture.nl/en/events/infecte…cities-8-istanbul
• Center for Spatial Justice, Mekanda Adalet Derneği (MAD) centerforspatialjustice.org/
• Beyond İstanbul beyond.istanbul/
• Kanal İstanbul (official narrative) www.kanalistanbul.gov.tr/tr
• Kanal İstanbul (environmental contestation) www.nationalgeographic.com/science/art…tal-impacts
• Müşterek (commons) musterekler.sehak.org/
• River Basin Studies mekandaadalet.org/en/program/river-basin-studies/
• Hope Archive mekandaadalet.org/en/hope-archive/
• Ecological Manifesto for a post pandemic world mekandaadalet.org/en/ecological-ma…-pandemic-world/
• Guest Column Funambulist magazine on design & racism thefunambulist.net/articles/guest-…r-adnan-adanali

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In Thirst Talk #3, Erik has a conversation with Eva Pfannes, one of the founders of OOZE. A talk about ‘oozing’ as a slow process without boundaries. The conversation starts in a Rotterdam neighbourhood and ends in a temporary natural swimming pond in London. Dip in!

Cited references

• Ooze (Eva Pfannes and Silvain Hartenberg) www.ooze.eu.com/
• IABR “Down to Earth / Whose Energy is it, anyway?”: Local Energy Action Plan (LEAP) www.iabr.nl/en/projectatelier/leap2 www.ooze.eu.com/en/urban_strategy local_energy_action_plan_rotterdam/
• Harvesting energy from rivers: aquathermy www.cedelft.eu/en/publications/2…essment-framework
• Venice Architecture Biennale, “How Will We Live Together. www.labiennale.org/en/architecture…t-hashim-sarkis
• Future Island, Ooze’s contribution with Marjetica Potrč for the exhibition “As One Planet” (Central pavilion, Giardini) www.ooze.eu.com/en/urban_prototype/future_island/
• Humans have only been around (half) a second in Earth’s life. earthhow.com/earth-timeline-geo…al-history-events/ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologic_time_scale
• Of Soil and Water: King’s Cross Pond Club, London www.ooze.eu.com/en/urban_prototyp…_cross_pond_club/
• MIF - ministry of fence, The Bartlett Diploma, 1996, Eva Pfannes
• The Biosphere dome experiment: “a colossal failure” (1991) www.nytimes.com/2019/03/29/sunday…imate-change.html

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this second Thirst Talk, Sophie meets designer and Istanbulite Nur Horsanalı, who spent a lot of time on the famous Galata bridge to observe fishermen and the social and economic structure that surrounds them. There is a lot of ‘halletmek’ going on there. What is halletmek? Tune in and find out.

Cited references

• Nur on insta www.instagram.com/nurhorsanali/
• Young Curators’ Group, 5th İstanbul Design Biennale empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/5th-istan…rators-group
• Desiccate with Care, part of New Civic Rituals empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/1…te-with-care
• Finnish Pavilion of the 22nd Triennale di Milano triennale.org/en/events/aalto-un…oto-mikko-raskinen
• 4th İstanbul Design Biennial, A School of Schools aschoolofschools.iksv.org/
• IKSV podcast (Turkish spoken) www.spreaker.com/user/11517119/tasbie-ep10-flac-se
• Halletmek pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/en/glossary
• Nur Horsanalı, “Halletmek”, İstanbul Bilgi University: 2017 issuu.com/nurhorsanali/docs/halletmek_pdf/
• Galata bridge Four versions and many proposals preceded the current version of the Galata Bridge (among others, a 1502 design sketch by Leonardo da Vinci), built by the Turkish construction company STFA between the districts of Karaköy and Eminönü. It was completed in 1994. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galata_Bridge
• Çesme (public fountain) pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/en/istanbul
• Self-organisation and system D design www.hathawaydesigns.org/system-d-academy.html

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

Testing İstanbul's Waters: Thirst Talk #1 – with Li An Phoa

In this first episode Erik meets up with researcher and activist Li An Phoa, who walked 15.000 kilometers in the past 10 years to mobilise all stakeholders involved in the well being of rivers. A talk about the precious 2% of fresh, drinkable water there is on this planet.

Cited references

• Drinkable Rivers and the role that the Rupert river in Québec, Canada played in mobilising Li An Phoa drinkablerivers.org/our-story/
• De Drinkbare Maas Afl. 1-3 (NPO Start, De Boeddhistische Blik) www.npostart.nl/de-boeddhistische…3-2020/KN_1713433
• De Nieuwe Waterweg www.rijkswaterstaat.nl/water/vaarweg…euwe-waterweg
• Francesco Careri, Walkscapes. Walking as an aesthetic practice, Culicidae Architectural Press : 2017) culicidaearchitecturalpress.com/careri-walkscapes/
• To walk, Rebecca Solnit writes, is to take a “subversive detour.” See Solnit Rebecca, Wanderlust: a history of walking, Verso: 2002. (See also from the same author the great A Field Guide to Getting Lost). www.newyorker.com/recommends/read/…y-rebecca-solnit
• Following complaints from citizens, İstanbul’s mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu recently took up the task of restoring and reactivating the city’s fountains, çesmes. pluriverse.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/en/istanbul
• Mayors Network Report drinkablerivers.org/download/mayors…2f0ab1618757154
• Only 2% of the water on the planet is drinkable www.worldwildlife.org/industries/fre…hwater-systems
• Clean up your personal care : an insightful infographic design by Angela Morelli thewaterweeat.com/
• Riverbed (miscellaneous online definitions) The ground over which a river usually flows. The channel in which a river flows or has flowed. The area between the banks of a river usually covered by water. The path where a river runs, or where a rivers once ran.
• “An optimist for the Twenty-Second Century. Meeting Arne Naess High Up in the Mountains.” This interview by eco artist Jan van Boeckel, published on Open Air Philosophy, was held as part of the production of the film “The Call of the Mountain: Arne Naess and the Deep Ecology Movement” (1997). Within the field of environmental philosophy, Arne Naess is perhaps most known for coining the term “deep ecology”, an approach to environmental problems that looks for its roots deep in the structure of our western society and the world views that guide it.
• openairphilosophy.org/wp-content/upl…VanBoeckel.pdf

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

This bonus exercise, recorded by Jay and Isa themselves, is all about choosing a ‘sit-spot’ and building up a relation with it over time. Thank you: Starhawk for inspiration and guidance and Jack Jordan for sound production.

Share your special spot findings via pluriverse@hetnieuweinstituut.nl.

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

Warming Up to the Pluriverse #8: On making the yes and the no With Jay Jordan & Isa Frémaux

In this last – but much more to come, stay tuned! – Warming Up talk we meet Jay Jordan and Isa Frémeaux, co-founders of Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination (Labofii). This lab brings artists and activists together to design tools and acts of disobedience and resistance. Unhappy with the world of performance and art (Jay) and institutional education (Isa), they created their own practice and approach in which there is always a ‘no’ and a ‘yes’ present, after the zapatista movement. Since 2015 Jay and Isa are residents of the zad (zone à défendre, zone to defend) in Notre-Dame-des-Landes, close to Nantes. From a reserved area for an airport, these 4000 acres evolved over the last 50 years in a beautiful life experiment. A place where the gaps between art, politics and daily life are dissolved. Listen to an electric talk about ‘a world that exists today, because it wasn’t allowed to exist to start with’. And if it is up to us, this is only part 1…

References

• Paths Through Utopias (112 min) vimeo.com/218495549
• Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination labofii.wordpress.com/ www.labo.zone (as of April 2021)
• ZAD Forever Blog zadforever.blog/
• Read about the insurgent roadworker here: Jordan John & Fremeaux Isabelle, “Cultures of Rebellion. Notes against extractivist art and for the art of life”, in: Klaxon 13 – Taking action with the living, 2019 accessible online: www.cifas.be/sites/default/file…living_-_pdf_1.pdf “Dead Man”, Chris Burden, 1972
• Notes from Nowhere (Ainger Katharine, Chesters Graeme, Credland Tony, Jordan John, Stern Andrew and Whitney Jennifer, eds). We are everywhere: the irresistible rise of global anticapitalism. London/New York: Verso Books, 2003 artactivism.gn.apc.org/home.htm
• The Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination. A user’s guide to demanding the impossible. London/New York: Minor Compositions/Port Watson, 2010. Accessible online at: demandingimpossible.wordpress.com/
• “As we speak a zad just got evicted against the construction of a high speed train in Gonesse near Paris”, March 4 2021. reporterre.net/A-Gonesse-la-Zad-…a-lutte-renforcee
• ‘Remembrement’ (French denomination using the metaphor of body parts for land consolidation processes aimed at scaling up agricultural land) fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembrement
• Naturalistes en lutte. (Amateur and professional collective of naturalists mapping the ZAD to assess its ecological value. In French) naturalistesenlutte.wordpress.com/
• “1974 is when the zad started. It started out as a movement by farmers for nourishing land.” See: Lambert Bernard, Les Paysans dans la Lutte des classes, Paris, Éditions du Seuil, Collections Politiques, 1970
• Letter from the inhabitants who resist (2008) in: Defending the Zad, Mauvaise Troupe Collective, Éditions de l’Éclat, 2015, p.5 mauvaisetroupe.org/spip.php?article143
• Brian Eno, Axis Thinking www.servinglibrary.org/journal/6/axis-thinking
• ZAD ritual on 17.01.2021 for the anniversary of the abandonment of the airport project, with the collective La CAR - Cellule d’Actions Rituelles of the ZAD www.youtube.com/watch?v=zABCfKb3y…&feature=youtu.be

More digging material:

• Two small documentaries on the ZAD www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDj5WY01o08 www.youtube.com/watch?v=InUtCdDQlCY
• John Jordan and Isabelle Frémeaux in conversation with Rob Hopkins transitionnetwork.org/news-and-blog/…y-imagination/
• The future of protest (Dutch spoken, 40 min) www.vpro.nl/programmas/tegenlic…st-van-protest.html
• Faire des Cabanes (making huts, French spoken, 9 min 31) vimeo.com/291501146

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

A pluriversal homework task by Arturo Escobar.

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this talk we meet Arturo Escobar himself, author of ‘Designs for the Pluriverse. Radical Interdependence, Autonomy and the Making of Worlds’ (2018, Duke University Press), the book we use as a guide for our pluriversal search. Escobar is Emeritus Professor of Anthropology and Political Ecology at the University of North Carolina. As early as 1987, he criticised the downside of ‘development’ from a Western perspective. His search for plural ways to co-inhabit this planet is inspired by Afro-Colombian social movements, and their plea to realise ‘a world in which many worlds fit’. In this personal conversation design is approached both as a system, and as a language and praxis to activate the notions of radical interdependence and – communal – autonomy.

References

• Kothari Ashish, Salleh Ariel, Escobar Arturo, Demaria Federico and Acosta Alberto Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary, Delhi: Tulika/AuthorsUpfront (AUF), 2019. License: Creative Commons. Accessible online.
• Escobar, Arturo. 2020. Pluriversal Politics: The Real and the Possible. Durham: Duke University Press. www.dukeupress.edu/pluriversal-politics
• Osterweil, Michal, Kriti Sharma, and Arturo Escobar. Designing Relationally: Mankind and Restor(y)ing Life. Bloomsbury Press, forthcoming.
• Rising inequality: Red Handkerchief Protests in Colombia www.arte.tv/fr/videos/097615-00…-rouges-de-la-faim/
• Protests of Nasa indigenous people against the government’s handling of the pandemic distribution.arte.tv/fiche/ARTE_REP…_LA_TRIBU_NASA
• Escobar Arturo. Autonomía y diseño. La realización de lo comunal, Universidad del Cauca, 2016 www.slideshare.net/delDespojoCrnic…-arturo-escobar
• Why the Philodendron Monstera has holes! www.sciencemag.org/news/2013/01/sc…ss-cheese-plant
• The book by Hubert Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow, Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics (1982) first directed Escobar’s thinking on "development" towards a Foucauldian interpretation of development as a "discourse".
• For more details on the 1998 river basin workshop that Escobar co-designed, particularly its contribution to conceptualizing "the territory" and the Pacific region as a "region-territory of ethnic groups", see Escobar Arturo, Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World (1995/2011).
• The term diseño de culturas (design of cultures) emerged in the mid-80s within the work that the foundation Fundacion HablaScribe (set up by Alvaro Pedrosa, professor at Universidad del Valle, Cali) did on research and activism with grassroots groups all over the Colombian South West.
• Winograd Terry and Flores Fernando. Understanding computers and cognition. A new foundation for design. Addison-Wesley Professional, 1987
• Margulis Lynn, Sagan Dorian. What is Life? University of California Press, 1995/2000.
• Maturana Humberto and Gerda Verden-Zöller. The Origin of Humanness in the Biology of Love. Charlottesville, V: Imprint Academic, 2008.
• Nhat Hanh, Thich. The World We Have: A Buddhist Approach to Peace and Ecology. Berkeley, CA: Parallax, 2008.
• Ferreira da Silva, Denise. 2015. “Before Man: Sylvia Wynter’s Rewriting of the Modern Episteme.” In K. McKittrick, ed. Sylvia Wynter. On Being Human as Praxis. Durham: Duke University Press.
• “Design/ing Paths towards Post-Covid Transitions: Reimagining socio-human systems on a pluriversal key, Design PhD 2020 Summer School, Polimi PhD programme in Design, Politecnico di Milano, June 22, 2020 www.youtube.com/watch?v=3d2jXRs7L8I&t=600s
• The idea to move away from institutional concepts of health, education and agriculture to the active forms of engagement with and in the worlds we inhabit through healing, learning, and growing food was first articulated by Gustavo Esteva, Universidad de la Tierra, Oaxaca, México.

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

The main conversation ends with the notion of a child-like sexual/sensual energy that we tend to disconnect with while growing up. In the bonus track Camila dives into ‘that beautiful thing that we feel in our whole body’. It is linked to the vagus nerve that connects the brain to our sexual organs. How can we (re)activate this nerve? Listen!

References

• “ The vagus nerve is a wonderful channel of sexual energy.” selfcervix.com/pages/science
• “The gag reflex has a lot to do with life and death. It triggers a kind of release.” www.biologyonline.com/dictionary/gag-reflex
• Transition Design borrows methodologies from Social Sciences to address so-called “wicked” problems (climate change, poverty, loss of biodiversity, pollution) in an effort to catalyse societal transition towards more sustainable and desirable futures. See critical writings by Cameron Tonkinwise on the matter. www.cd-cf.org/articles/design-fo…-from-and-to-what/
• Glossary entry web mag
• Mamihlapinatapai is a beautifully succinct fuegan word referring to seeing and being seen, the meaning of which Chilean curator Camila Marambio phrases as “I know that you know that we both know what we want, but neither of us, neither of I’s, is willing to say so.” en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mamihlapinatapai
• About the Pluriverse extra entry (…) One of my ancient poems is about the word recorder, which means to touch again the chords of the heart. “Re” is again, and “cordar” comes from “core”, and “core” is the heart. – Cecilia Vicuña in conversation with Camila Marambio in 2015 in: MARAMBIO Camila, VICUÑA Cecilia, Slow Down Fast, A Toda Raja (An ancestral festering wound), Berlin: Errant Bodies, 2019, p.22

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this sixth Warming Up talk, we meet Camila Marambio – a being as plural as the worlds she inhabits, falls in love with, and seeks to protect. Camila is the founder/director of Ensayos, a nomadic interdisciplinary research program that has been collectively unraveling the eco politics of the archipelago of Karokynka a.k.a. Tierra del Fuego for about a decade now. Camila completed her Phd in Curatorial Practice at Monash University, Melbourne with both a TV web series “DISTANCIA" and an exegesis (a critical explanation or interpretation of a text) with the title: ‘DISTANCIA: A measure of intimacy.’ Besides all this, Camila identifies and plays with the roles of private investigator, eco-sexual, permaculture enthusiast, and flautón chino player/dancer. Her home base is in Papudo, a coastal town two hours north of Santiago de Chile.

A mesmerising talk about cosmic changes, circular stories, a pluriversal owl and the notion of with-with.

References

• Ensayos ensayostierradelfuego.net “Corona under the ocean. The see undoes the land” Tba21-academy – Corona-under-the-ocean-the-sea-undoes-the-land-w-camila-marambio Web series “DISTANCIA" (co-directed with Carolina Saquel) www.ladistancia.tv/
• Four of the chapters from the exegesis “DISTANCIA: A measure of intimacy” have been published as separate essays: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.108…22.2020.1831805 brooklynrail.org/special/RIVER_RA…l/The-Go-Between www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.108…49.2020.1774865 www.discipline.net.au/
• In 2021 Camila will be a post-doc fellow at The Seed Box: An Environmental Humanities Collaboratory (Linköping University (LiU), Sweden). Her work there will be centred on her forthcoming book Sandcastles: cancerous bodies and their necro/powers co-authored with gender scholar Nina Lykke. theseedbox.se/ kerb-journal.com/articles/triptych-of-viral-tales ninalykke.net/about/
• Eco-sexual sexecology.org/
• In the cosmic weather report that opens this talk, Camila speaks of a possible shift to the era of Aquarius. earthsky.org/human-world/when-w…-of-aquarius-begin mobile.facebook.com/106381397697619…w.google.com%2F
• The Chilean town of Papudo on the Pacific is located on a fault line. “Every evening it shakes, it tremors.” www.memoriachilena.gob.cl/archivos2/pd…C0064447.pdf www.municipalidadpapudo.cl/emergencia.pdf link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02042278
• The flautón chino is a “two-in-one” instrument used as a “spiritual technology” in the Andes. Its players are called dancers. boletinmuseoprecolombino.cl/wp/wp-conte…rtic.-2.pdf www.memoriachilena.gob.cl/archivos2/pd…C0038283.pdf
• “We all make beginners’ mistakes”. Some of Camila’s mentors and elders, whom she wishes to acknowledge in guiding her on her path, include artist Cecilia Vicuña, Kombumerri philosopher Mary Graham, conservation biologist Bárbara Saavedra, and the poet Fidel Sepulveda. www.ceciliavicuna.com/news polsis.uq.edu.au/profile/2235/mary-graham chile.wcs.org/Nosotros/Personal/Search/Equipo.aspx en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidel_Sepulveda_Llanos
• El con-con en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rufous-legged_owl www.konkon.cl/
• Cosmological Garden Course, Center of Arts, Design and Social Research (CAD+SR). centerartsdesign.org/
• Mesoderm biologydictionary.net/mesoderm/
• Artists Christy Gast and Caitlin Franzmann are fellow Ensayistas.ensayostierradelfuego.net/programs/ens…tic-connect/
• Greg Lehman and Julie Gough are Tasmanian friends and mentors.www.utas.edu.au/alumni/our-alumni…essor-greg-lehman juliegough.net/brief-biography/

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In addition to our main conversation with architect/researcher Sean Leonard, co-founder of Alice Yard, we added a short audio clip about Stones have Laws, a film made by Lonnie van Brummelen, Siebren de Haan en Tolin Erwin Alexander, in close cooperation with Saamaka and Okanisi communities along the Surinam River. We all enjoyed this ‘visual experience’. 

Reference

• “Dee Sitonu a Weti / Stone have Laws” (2018) trailer www.filmfonds.nl/page/7836/stones-have-laws

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In the fifth talk we meet up online with architect/researcher Sean Leonard, part of Co-RD Limited, and co-founder of Alice Yard, a contemporary art space located in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, which hosts and facilitates an ongoing programme of artists and artists’ projects, where networking, collaboration, improvisation and play are key. In 2020 Leonard was selected as the inaugural recipient of the Tilting Axis Fellowship made possible among others by Het Nieuwe Instituut. This position includes collaborations with the Amsterdam Museum, De Appel, The Black Archives and FKA Witte de With / Melly. This is also how ‘In Search of the Pluriverse’ and Leonard crossed paths. A vivid talk about heritage, the yard as a space of play and negotiation, swamp lodges and stilt walkers.

References

• Tilting Axis Fellowship 2020 Jury Report tiltingaxisfellowship.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/en/…hip
• Sean Leonard’s online archive & journal korjaal-ing.space
• Alice Yard aliceyard.blogspot.com/
• Caribbean Beat, Issue 141, MEP Publishers Sean Leonard: “Artists, this space is available” | Caribbean Beat Magazine; www.caribbean-beat.com/issue-141/sea…ixzz6couWBUsp
• 1962, year of independence of Trinidad (The video below is a classic piece of footage for many Trinbagonians) www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVlcBLX6UHU
• First Peoples I. Arie Boomert, The Indigenous Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago from the First Settlers until Today. Leiden, The Netherlands: Sidestone Press, 2016. www.sidestone.com/books/the-indige…nidad-and-tobago
• First Peoples II. Tracy Assing www.bocaslitfest.com/author/tracy-assing/
• First Peoples III. Arawak and Caribs First Peoples (Although a short article, Sean Leonard found this reference useful as it puts on the table the issue of the convenient and contrived narratives about the the indigenous peoples by the colonisers) blogs.scientificamerican.com/anthropolo…umbus-met/
• Capuchin missionaries - from the Fransiscan order of roman catholic priests (The Capuchins arose in 1525 with the purpose of returning to a stricter observance of the rule established by Francis of Assisi in 1209. The activities of the Capuchins were not confined to Europe. From an early date they undertook missions to non-Catholics in America, Asia and Africa, and a College was founded in Rome for the purpose of preparing their members for foreign missions.) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Fr…s_Minor_Capuchin
• Place names and languages of indigenous descent in Trinidad sta.uwi.edu/stan/article13.asp
• Hosay Yard Festival www.triniview.com/hosay/2706051.html
• Woodwork & Belmont neighborhoods, Port of Spain, Trinidad www.instagram.com/p/B7ymEvFpqGS/?u…ig_web_copy_link
• The little Carib Theatre by Beryl Mc Burnie www.caribbean-beat.com/issue-20/bery…st-lady-dance
• 1000 Moko Jumbie project by Kriston Chen caribbeanlinked.com/editions/caribb…s/kriston-chen/
• Ndyuka Maroons in Suriname www.mpm.edu/research-collection…ons-research/ndyuka
• Dénètem Touam Bona, « Cosmo-poétique du refuge, Comment les esclaves en fuite ont réinventé la liberté », Z Revue itinérante d’enquête et de critique sociale, n°12 Guyane Trésors et conquêtes, 2018, available online at : www.terrestres.org/2019/01/15/cosm…ique-du-refuge/
• On art and social practice in Trinidad (not discussed but interesting further reading) articulatecaribbean.com/50-50/

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this fourth talk, Wong & Krier speak with architectural researcher Kornelia Dimitrova and social designer Bernhard Lenger, co-founders of Foundation We are, a collective of nine creative minds and makers that functions both as a playground for their different individual practices, and as a joint design consulting agency aiming to transform social and legal systems. How to keep your design practice close to the ground? Can we still have hope for Europe? And what is the similarity between a personal burn-out and climate change? Tune in to find out.

References

• Foundation We Are foundationweare.org/
• Creative Industries Fund NL talent page, Bernhard Lenger talent.stimuleringsfonds.nl/studio_bernhard_lenger
• World Design Embassies www.worlddesignembassies.com/embassies/water-2/
• Waterdier (trans. water animal) www.waterdier.nl/
• This is Ecocide www.thisisecocide.org/
• Studio Kornelia Dimitrova www.kodimitrova.com/info.html
• Oase Journal, Issue 107 (forthcoming 2020) www.oasejournal.nl/en/Issues
• Hannah van Luttervelt www.hannahvanluttervelt.nl
• Letter to Europe www.instagram.com/p/B8JAyEjlvBx/?u…ig_web_copy_link
• Full letter to Europe recording User-670828571 – Letter-to-europe
• Sarah Wiener, Austrian politician www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/19767…H_WIENER/home
• Bulgaria protests, begun on July 9 2020 (timeline of the first 100 days) www.svobodnaevropa.bg/a/30896267.html
• Bivol (Investigative Journalism) bivol.bg/
• Radio Svobodna Evropa / Radio Free Europe (Daily News) www.svobodnaevropa.bg/
• Ibiza Scandal www.theguardian.com/world/2019/may/…-does-it-matter
• Maxime Benvenuto maximebenvenuto.com/
• Speculative scenarios for mental health institution GGze, Eindhoven www.tue.nl/en/research/researc…ggze-de-grote-beek/
• Reporting from the intersection of mental health and sustainable development www.archined.nl/2020/12/reporting…able-development/
• “Social Design for Guenine Inclusivity” seminar, The Social Design Lobby ddw.nl/en/programme/4529/soc…d-genuine-inclusivity
• Kaylee Rosalina kayleerosalina.nl/
• Social Design Showdown www.socialdesign.nu/
• Hillary Cottam, Participle collective www.participle.net/
• Georges Orwell, Shooting an Elephant www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-f…an-elephant/
• Empathic research pure.tue.nl/ws/portalfiles/port…2543_9205_11_PB.pdf
• Bas Raaijmakers (STBDY) on empathic conversations www.stby.eu/2017/02/03/empathic-conversations-2/ Manzini Ezio. Design, when everybody designs. An introduction to design for social innovation. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2015. mitpress.mit.edu/books/design-whe…verybody-designs
• Renée Frissen, Open Embassy www.openembassy.nl/en/about-us-2/
• Uncut bonus track reference
• Anne Ligtenberg, BNO www.bno.nl/partners/anne-ligtenberg-19912
• Kiki van Eyck kikiandjoost.com/
• Not discussed in detail in this take, but linked:
• Social Design Lobby interview archive www.thesocialdesignlobby.com
• The Moral Lab www.kodimitrova.com/moral-lab.html
• Burn-out. Exhaustion on a planetary scale, a research led by Marina Otero Verzier at Het Nieuwe Instituut (2019). research-development.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/en/…ale
• McPHIE, J. Mental health and wellbeing in the anthropocene : a posthuman inquiry. Palgrave Macmillan, 2019 www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9789811333255

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

Reference

DD BNO magazine www.bno.nl/page/dd

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this third warming up talk we speak to Mariana Pestana, curator of the fifth Istanbul Biennale entitled “Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one” about what kind of ‘radical design imagination’ (Escobar 2018) the world needs, today.

In a nutshell, Mariana’s critical social practice investigates “the role that fiction can play in re-imagining futures for an age marked by technological progress and an ecological crisis.” Initially trained as an architect, Mariana lives and works between Porto and London where she has taught at Royal College of Art and Central St Martins. She is one of the co-founders of The Decorators, a collective that produces collaborative public interventions and cultural programs, such as Expedition Empathy (Azores, 2019). The publications she (co)edited over the past years speak volumes: “ The Future Starts Here ” Victoria and Albert Museum(2018); “Eco Visionaries: Towards an Interspecies Future” Matadero Madrid (2019).

References

• New Civic Rituals empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/programme…ivic-rituals
• Sundial of the Blind by Eli Bensusan empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/1…of-the-blind
• Microbial Fruits of Istanbul by Orkan Telhan and elii empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/1…-of-istanbul
• LANZONI Susan. Empathy: A History, Yale Books, 2018 yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300222685/empathy
• Vernon Lee, one of the first to write about empathy www.jstor.org/stable/25067229?se…_info_tab_contents
• Critical Cooking Show empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/programme…ooking-shows
• Library of Land and Sea empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/programme…land-and-sea
• Partnerships by FRAUD empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/4…partnerships
• Earthable by Aslihan Demirtas
• Agros Istanbul by Aslihan Demirtas empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/4…ros-istanbul
• Sumitra Upham, curator of Programmes tasarimbienali.iksv.org/en/5th-istanb…ratorial-team
• Future Anecdotes www.futureanecdotesistanbul.com/Future_An…/fai.html
• Mattering of a productive mythology by Alsi Uludağ This case study, on which Wong & Krier zoom in during the talk, maps the tools, materials and spatial conditions that transformed the mythology of the Büyük Menderes Graben, with support from the women of Kızılcaköy, the olive and fig growers and their lawyer. empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/4…ve-mythology
• APUJARAI Arjun. The Future a Cultural Fact. Essays on the Global Condition, Verso Books, 2013 www.versobooks.com/books/1171-the-…s-cultural-fact
• ILLICH Ivan. Tools for Conviviality, Fontana/Collins, 1973/1975 monoskop.org/images/3/3e/Illich…viviality_1975.pdf
• Material Histories: Sands, Soils, Recipes and Other Archives by Counterspace empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/project/4…her-archives
• Cooking With Stories by depatriarchise design and Mayar El-Bakry empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/critical-…with-stories
• The case of meat by Valeria Meiller & Agustin Schang empathyrevisited.iksv.org/en/critical-…case-of-meat

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

Reference

• partaste.com/worldrecipes/pa-am…t-spain-catalonia/

In this second ‘warming up talk’ we meet Miquel Hervás Gómez, Catalan by birth, living and working for 10 years in Amsterdam. As a graphic designer Miquel embraces the idea of the ‘collective’. He is a member of design/research platform Fanfare and the online collaborative Carne Kids. In parallel to his design practice, Miquel teaches at both the Sandberg Institute and the Rietveld Academy and manages the bookbinding workshop BBBBgraBB for both institutions.

References

• Gerrit Rietveld Academie / Book binding workshop rietveldacademie.nl/en/page/1177/boekbinderij
• Disarming Design, Sandberg Instituut disarmingdesign.com/projects/phd/sa…berg-instituut/
• History of the autonomous region of Catalonia www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-20345071
• Black flag en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_black_flags
• Carne Kids carne.work/
• Fanfare fanfarefanfare.nl/

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.

In this talk we meet Joke Robaard, independent thinker and maker. Active since the 80s in the world of design. Deeply involved in art and education. Developed a broad framework to reflect on design, materiality, weaving. Recently co-authored the book Archive Species with Camiel van Winkel on her ever-growing collection of (fashion) images. In short: always traced her own course.

Does the idea of the Pluriverse as enunciated by Escobar in his 2018 book resonate with your practice, we asked.

References

• George Floyd, Black Lives Matter blacklivesmatter.com/
• Daniel Keneman, Behavioral Economy kahneman.socialpsychology.org/
• Deleuze Gille and Guattari Félix, The Smooth & the Striated in: Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F., A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, translated by B. Massumi. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2013. www.bloomsbury.com/uk/a-thousand-p…-9781780935379/
• Stirrup A stirrup is a light frame or ring that holds the foot of a rider, attached to the saddle by a strap, often called a stirrup leather. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stirrup
• Guerilla Girls www.guerrillagirls.com/
• Bowery Houston/First Street community garden www.greenguerillas.org/history
• Green Guerilla www.greenguerillas.org/
• Joke Robaard took part in “Incidental Alterations: National and International Studio Program Exhibition 1994–1995” at MOMA PS1 New York. www.moma.org/artists/72948?locale=en
• Food Forest Book Oostwoud Madelon, Voedselbos. Inspiratie voor ontwerp en beheer, Knnv Uitgeverij, 2019 knnvuitgeverij.nl/artikel/madelon-oostwoud.html
• Lien de terre (trans. soil bond) A law in France to preserve agricultural land from real estate speculation) terredeliens.org/

For more information about In Search of the Pluriverse visit hnix.nl/pluriverse and follow @insearchofthepluriverse on Instagram.